


Knock Yourself Out

by Deepdarkwaters



Series: Bespoke [6]
Category: Kingsman: The Secret Service (2015)
Genre: Gen, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-05-19
Updated: 2016-05-19
Packaged: 2018-06-09 09:55:46
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 846
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6901183
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Deepdarkwaters/pseuds/Deepdarkwaters
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"Do you think Merlin's okay?" Roxy asks quietly - and Eggsy looks at the closed cockpit door, remembering how the click of the lock had sounded far too loud when Merlin shut himself in there just before take off, and murmurs back, "I dunno."</p>
            </blockquote>





	Knock Yourself Out

**Author's Note:**

> I'm just going to pretend there was no buggering of prisoners, because it was fucking stupid.

The plane trip home is weird mostly because it's not as horrible as Eggsy feels it should be, given everything that's happened over the last day. It's all too unreal: the spacey sleeplessness where shapes seem sharper and colours seem brighter but you can't doze off even if you try because your body is still struggling to shake off the memory of literally fighting for your life.

Roxy manages to sleep for a few hours once they've both checked in with their families, fitful and frowning until Eggsy strokes her hair for a bit and she settles, but he just can't switch off. The plane feels as claustrophobic as his old bedroom and he wants to _run_ from it the way he used to back in Rowley Way to shake off pent-up frustration, flinging himself off balconies and skidding down lamp posts with a fearless sort of grace that terrified his mother and made all the younger kids on the estate gaze up at him with open mouths and starry eyes.

The next best thing is booze, then - probably appallingly expensive and older than he is, knowing Kingsman, and not intended for gulping back like a bottle of water after a workout, but fuck it. The whisky numbs his mouth and warms his throat, smooth and smoky on the way down and then acrid on the way back up when he's overcome by a fleeting surprise fit of sobbing somewhere over the Baltic Sea that makes him splutter backwash into the bottle and tear frantically at his top few shirt buttons, feeling suddenly like he can't breathe. Roxy wakes then, a single sleepy blink before she's immediately alert, and slips out of her armchair and onto the carpet to hold Eggsy's wrists steady, take the glass from him, help him with the buttons. She sits there beside him until he's breathing right again, watching him warily the whole time.

"Fucking hell," Eggsy finally says, hoarse and wobbling but calmer, 

"Better?"

"No."

She leans against him then, hooking her arm around his. "Want to talk?"

"No."

"Go to sleep, then, before I stun you with my watch. Percy said we'll be needed when we land."

He rests his cheek against her hair, leans back against her so they're almost propping one another up like cards in a castle. Tries to switch off, but the very act of trying only seems to highlight how on edge he still is.

"Do you think Merlin's okay?" Roxy asks quietly - and Eggsy looks at the closed cockpit door, remembering how the click of the lock had sounded far too loud when Merlin shut himself in there just before take off, and murmurs back, "I dunno."

* * *

Ten minutes after landing, after Roxy raced down the plane steps to find Percival and fill him in on everything, Eggsy's managed to find the energy to haul himself into a chair but not actually stand up and walk yet. He feels listless, more exhausted than he knew it was possible to be without actually keeling over dead. Feeling nothing at all about having killed probably more people than he's ever met in his life is... impossible to parse. There's something strangely draining about it: not about the killing itself, but about how easy it was and how little he cares now it's all over.

Another ten minutes, another inch or two of whisky, and still Merlin doesn't emerge from the cockpit. Eggsy wonders whether he's waiting to be left alone.

 _Too fucking bad_ , he thinks, and heaves himself out of the chair to go and knock on the door.

"Hey, Merlin? You alright?"

He hears the lock then - it's quiet this time, somehow, a soft little metallic click - and pushes the door open.

"You should go and be with your family," Merlin tells him. "I'll need you back here tomorrow to start clearing up this carnage." He sounds calm, almost conversational, but flat and robotic like Siri answering a question. It's eerie as fuck.

"You got a family?"

"No," Merlin says after a moment. "Can I have some of that?"

"Knock yourself out," Eggsy tells him as he's handing the bottle over, then weakly adds, "I didn't mean, you know, literally," when Merlin chugs half the contents.

He stands there awkwardly behind Merlin's shoulder, drinks when Merlin returns the bottle, stares out the window at the unsettling emptiness of the hangar when Merlin takes the whisky back for another pull. It looks unreal out there without the usual dozens of people running around, like an abandoned film lot or a Lego set without the little plastic figures.

"Right," Merlin says eventually. "That's our wallowing ration for the day. We've got work to do."

He sounds more like himself now, calm and capable and as solid and reassuring as steel - but when they get off the plane, when they meet Roxy pelting towards them across the concrete shouting something about _you need to take this call from the Lexington hospital_ , Eggsy can hear the way Merlin's shuddering breath falls out of him like he's been punched.


End file.
